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Six Degrees of Separation from Lilia Cuntapay
Year of Release: 2011
Director & Screenwriter: Antoinette Jadaone
Producers: Cinema One Originals & Post Manila
Cast: Lilia Cuntapay, Gerladine Villamil, Antoinette Jadaone, Joel Saracho, Bella Mercado, Angel Castanos, Mary Jane Alejo, Opaline Santos, Carlo Cannu, Fernando Cruz, Eivy Rose Lavalle, Mark Sicat dela Cruz, Pio Balbuena, Moises Magisa, Ruffa Zuueta, Cris Lorena, Ring Perez, Neil Colango, Jo Macasa, Roman Perez Jr., Angela Andaya, Chanel Latorre, Rita Vargas, Joe Tutanes, Ramon Rebancos, Michael Orozco, Moncia Galvey-Tan, Edwin Sayson, Senaca Moraleda, Vicnent Matteu, Erbin Bajado, Leo Valencia, Frances Mae Ramos, Jason Domantay, Ethel Francisco, Vanessa Abastillas, Mark Dizon, Regina Valenzuela, Aileen Alcampado, Irene Villamor, Candy Cypres, Joenathann Alandy, Ronald Mendoza, Juan Miguel Severo, Jed Medrano, Dingdong Dantes, Kris Aquino, Peque Gallaga, Lore Reyes, Alwyn Uytingco, Topel Lee, Marian Rivera, Camille Prats, Rez Cortez, Maryo J. de los Reyes, Mercedes Cabral, Raquel Villavicencio, Karen delos Reyes, Niña Dolino, Rita Daniela, Armando Lao, Irma Adlawan, Rio Locsin, Erika Padilla
Real-life bit player Lilia Cuntapay thrives on her newfound celebrity status in her old age, in the working-class neighborhood where she lives. Her daughter has migrated to the US and converses with her by phone occasionally. Since she has no mobile device of her own, she asks her neighbor to take her calls so she can be apprised of any casting call. Genre directors are aware of her strong presence, especially in horror roles. Movie stars, however, had never heard of her—until her nomination for one of the older awards competitions. Her neighborhood shares her excitement when a TV crew arrives to interview her, and she prepares extensively for the ceremony. The night of the broadcast results in some disappointment, but she nevertheless keeps her spirits up all the way to awards night.
Mockumentaries are rarely attempted in Philippine cinema, which may seem ascribable to the limited market for nonmainstream formats. But Six Degrees of Separation from Lilia Cuntapay helps steer the conversation away from the usual audience-bashing that elitists indulge in when they want to assure themselves of their superiority. Despite the ease with which it can be ingested, nothing about the production looks hurried or low-rent. Director Antoinette Jadaone also had the good fortune to make the acquaintance of Lilia Cuntapay, who died not long after completing the project, and who had enough good sense to know when the roles she accepted had the potential to impact culture beyond their exhibition period. (If anything, Jadaone can be faulted for having too much tastefulness to illustrate the moments when Cuntapay said she’d accepted “bold” roles that involved nudity or obscenity, preferring to present her jump-scare scenes instead.) The format works superbly as an occasion for industry members to uphold one of their own, so amusingly though unsurprisingly we find filmmakers and even stars agreeing to play-act for the sake of providing dramatic anticipation in the then-patently fictional occasion of Cuntapay acquiring an awards nomination. The film will remain one of a kind, as Cuntapay had been, and will reward occasional rewatching for the moments when one wishes to recall once more why the medium is capable of catching fire among its audiences and practitioners.
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That Thing Called Tadhana
English Translation: That Thing Called Meant-to-Be
Additional Language: Ilocano
Year of Release: 2014
Director & Screenwriter: Antoinette Jadaone
Producers: Cinema One Originals, Epicmedia, Monoxide Works, One Dash Zero Cinetools
Cast: Angelica Panganiban, JM de Guzman, Joem Bascon, Carlos Castano, Joenel Canaria, Bianca Balbuena, JR Miano, Joi Bayan, Kelvin Dy, Martin Mayuga, Jane Torres, Marjarey Kasey Politico, Monique Ladimo
At the airport on his way home from overseas work in Rome, Anthony Lagdameo sees Mace Castillo unable to check in her luggage because of excess weight. He offers to carry some of her possessions since he will be traveling light. Mace is affected by tearjerker scenes in the movie that she watches, and confesses that her boyfriend had dumped her for another woman. Anthony opts to keep her company to help nurse her broken heart, even when she expresses a drunken wish to take a trip all the way north to Baguio. They discover along the way that Mace’s dream was to write short fiction, while Anthony’s was to be a book illustrator. Their further interactions reveal a mutual compatibility with each other, but the results of such a quick-blooming romance will sometimes be unpredictable for both of them.
The several crossovers from independent to mainstream film practice generally failed to find sustainable exemplars. That Thing Called Tadhana has been the most influential of the lot, and the reasons are immediately apparent: a strong, articulate woman meets-cute with an understandably smitten man, both unfazed by the prospect of overseas employment yet sharing some past experience of heartbreak, venturing into less-familiar scenic spots while exchanging wit-laden insights into each other’s situations, ending with a bittersweet lack of closure that heightens their newly formed romantic bond. One may wonder how such a plain, by-now predictable formula can continue to yield such a well-received series of follow-up projects, but TTCT is long-ago enough to provide us with clues. The first would be a light directorial touch, reminiscent of the French romantic comedies (notably those of Eric Rohmer), successfully appropriated by Richard Linklater for his Before trilogy (1995-2013) as well as by Korean filmmaker Hong Sang-soo. The next would be a feminist spin on the manic pixie dream-girl, a Hollywood stock character who winds up being domesticated by the man she falls for; TTCT’s self-ironic neurotic lead female refuses to yield to her male partner’s bemused stoicism, instead winning him over to her impulsively free-spirited approach to life. A special touch that only TTCT has been able to pull off so expertly that the entire movie takes on the quality of a well-remembered pleasant dream is when the heartbroken woman reaches for an ideal of true love via John Lloyd Cruz’s character in Cathy Garcia-Molina’s One More Chance (2007). The reflexive touch is unobtrusive mainly because of the credible manner in which Antoinette Jadaone succeeds in integrating it into the narrative. (Not surprisingly, her earlier indie project and full-length debut, Six Degrees of Separation from Lilia Cuntapay [2011], foregrounded this process by letting the main subject play herself in a mock-documentary.) TTCT affirms its innovative roots by being lesser-budgeted than its progeny, but overflowing with so much spunk and wisdom that it still manages to surpass all the rom-coms that it had since inspired.
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